115. Flower Pot [1937]

Although he held his first exhibition in Craiova at only 15 years old (some of the works were purchased, and the funds enabled him to undertake a study journey in Italy), Ion Țuculescu's artistic journey went through a long hiatus, up until around 1936 when, encouraged by his life partner, he resumed painting. Therefore, the work in question originates from the period of the artist's reunion with painting, a time deeply marked by the intensity of colour. Țuculescu graduated from medicine "magna cum laude" and started his career as a natural science teacher. The chosen professional path allowed him, however, to continue flirting with painting. He exhibited as a painter in 1938 at a personal exhibition organised in the Romanian Athenaeum building. The exhibition aroused curiosity, interest and admiration from critic George Oprescu, as well as appreciation from Gheorghe Petrașcu. Equipped with the skills of a self-taught artist, he carried out independent studies, "after nature and after masters", as he stated. He used his dual vocation, as a biologist and creator, to transcribe genuine pages of nature on canvas with the ingenuity of a scholar. He followed in the footsteps of his predecessors to the Mediterranean East and major Western capitals, thereby collecting the necessary visual material for future artistic experiments. He was inspired by Petrașcu, Andreescu or Luchian, but also considered the works of Van Gogh or Gauguin. His artistic space, infinite and with unusual manifestations, is crossed by artificial brightness and a brutal chromatic, having become a leitmotif. He incorporates ornamental chords into touches of black, a shade assimilated from Petrașcu's works. He maintains recognisable fragments of the real space from where he draws his inspirations, yet modifies them according to his stimuli. From rapeseed fields, Romanian village panoramas, Venetian canals, stone bridges and colourful Italian buildings, Ion Țuculescu leads us, through his works, on a welcomed journey around the world. Whether working in oil, or transposing the city landscape in watercolour, the artist aims to transform his canvas into a visual diary of his life. The vase with wildflowers, depicted in dark shades dominated by black, contrasts strongly with the white tablecloth and the blue-toned wall. Displayed in several exhibitions, beginning with his first personal exhibition at the Athenaeum and ending with the 1965 exhibition at the Constanta Art Museum or the retrospective organised at the National Museum of Art in 1999, the work in question has been consistently brought to the public's attention, remaining a milestone for the author's artistic debut. Ion Țuculescu remains in the history of Romanian art as an amateur who became a professional, with an immeasurable power of revitalising the old-fashioned stylistics of folk art.

References

VLASIU, Ion, "Ion Tuculescu"; Meridian Publishing House, Bucharest, 1966. COMARNESCU, Peter, "Tuculescu"; Meridian Publishing House, Bucharest, 1974. CARNECI, Magda, "Ion Tuculescu", Meridian Publishing House, Bucharest, 1984. DAVIDESCU, Catalin, "Ion Tuculescu. The Reconstruction", MNAC Publishing House, Bucharest, 2020.

Dimensions

width 52.5 cm, height 60 cm

Description

oil on canvas glued to cardboard, signed and dated bottom left, in blue, "I. Țuculescu, (19)37"

Research information

The artwork was part of the artist's personal exhibition organized at the Romanian Athenaeum, in 1938, cat.2. The artwork was part of the exhibition in Constanta, 1965, cat. 1. The artwork was part of the retrospective exhibition "Ion Țuculescu", National Museum of Art of Romania, 1999, cat.8.

Dating

1937

PROVENANCE

Julieta Drăguțescu's collection.

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